Iran

nonad - Azad Gallery, Tehran - May 23-28

If you're in Tehran later this month, please stop by Azad Gallery to view a showing of 'nonad', created by a wonderful American artist friend of mine.

Kristen Alvanson opens 'nonad' collection May 23, 2008, 4-8 p.m.

Azad Gallery is pleased to present nonad (of nines and nomads), a solo exhibition by the Iran-based American artist Kristen Alvanson, opening Friday, May 23. In Alvanson's first Tehran exhibition, a western artist reanimates her artistic experiments with an entirely new arsenal of conceptual and material resources.

Since leaving New York, Alvanson has explored the threefold of textiles, women, and the Middle East in all its formations, anomalies, enigmas, political speculations, and aesthetic conjectures. Her new work includes nomadic fabric chador (Persian veil) sculptures, abjad-9 drawings, and an animation from her Cosmic Drapery Project.

For the exhibition, Azad Gallery is transformed into a garden of hanging folds. Nine colorful chadors are hung throughout the gallery. As viewers weave through and interact with the installation, they discover implicit sociopolitical structures of these nomadic fabric sculptures as well as their nomadic persuasions in regard to art and creativity. At 350 cm x 190 cm, each chador contains nine panels, six made of different nomadic fabrics. The rest contain black fabric, the same fabric used for traditional back chadors.

On surrounding walls, the Abjad-9 drawings suggest collective shapes vaguely reminiscent of the patterns of traditional Islamic art. Drawn in Persian ink and calligraphic pen, the drawings reveal the affect space between women in veil or chador, and the forces, folds and movements between them. These elaborately nested structures include half-elliptical shapes, the shape of a Persian veil when fully spread out. These shapes represent women in chador as seen from above.

The animation ninefold is a further visualization of these complex, subterranean relationships and spaces. Like the chadors and the Abjad-9 drawings, it is structured by the number 9, standing for the occluded relations between textiles, women, and the Middle East. In the Middle Eastern occult, nine is the number of unceasing collectivity - worlds created through the hidden bonds of spells and collective tides.

Alvanson's nomadic fabric chadors explore the interactions between black and nomadic fabrics. These include the differences and compatibilities between patterns, textures, and weight; explicit folding lines; and the distribution of sequins. The potentials inherent in each fabric emerge as islands of alliance or as folds of opposition between state and nomadic art in the Middle East.

Kristen Alvanson (born in 1969 in Minneapolis) lives and works in Shiraz, Iran. She attended The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in New York and holds a degree from Sarah Lawrence College. Alvanson has exhibited in shows in both the United States and the Middle East. She will be participating in the upcoming International Roaming Biennial of Tehran. Her writing and artworks have been published in Collapse: Journal of Philosophical Research and Development, New Humanist, Frozen Tears III and will be included in an upcoming issue of Cabinet magazine.

For more information visit Alvanson's website or email Mohsen Nabizadeh of Azad Gallery. (No. 41, Salmas Sq., Golha Sq. Tehran, Iran +98 21 88008676)

Click here for a printable invitation to the opening.

The irony is this

We don't watch TV...in fact, we don't even have one anymore, so it was only today that I came to learn about this interview on 60 minutes with the president of Iran which aired in late September.

It is, sadly, another example of agendized media, with the interviewer hardly even listening to his guest, asking blatantly biased questions, and generally botching another opportunity to learn more about Iran, it's philosophies, it's culture, and it's place in the global scheme of things - political or otherwise. Ahmadinejad, as always, was quiet and respectful in his replies; never giving on that he was the subject of yet another farce marquerading as diplomacy.

I've really struggled with my feelings about Iran these past few years - it's a beautiful country with ugly laws that strangle the voices and souls of it's people. It's a modern place with the latest technology and fashion but shuttles itself into the darkness of an age passed with a bizarre control on art, music, information, and the internet. I've also struggled with feelings about my own government - the war in Iraq, the way Bush came to office, the strange mythology we're building around Islam where now the very word is mutually exclusive with 'terrorism'...
But the crucial difference is, I feel entirely comfortable writing and talking about the American government; penning the name of the president and attaching all manner of frustrated, pointedly negative sentiments. He may not like what I have to say if he ever took the time to read it, but he certainly wouldn't question my freedom to have done so, and no one would punish me for it in any sense of the word.

These latest public interactions with Iran's leader have left me both disappointed and utterly confused. On the one hand I have questions of my own, and they can never hope to be answered if the only people Ahmadinejad ever speaks to are under-the-table henchmen for the Bush team or media personalities with government hands making deposits in their pockets. But on the other hand, I'd be pretty damn scared to actually voice my questions if given the opportunity. That fear itself would be the basis for one of my most important questions: Does it mean something to him to know that I am afraid to ask the very questions I am most curious to learn the answers to? Does it mean something to him to know that I am afraid to write, that I actually hesitate before every word I type, when the topic is the Islamic Republic?

There are many things I never wrote while I was there - oh, nothing major. There were no big scandals I kept hidden. No observations of mythic proportion. But there were a number of little things I kept to myself; feelings about what it was like to be a woman in Iran in particular. I've been there and experienced life in Iran, at least as much as I could in the brief two and a half month visit, and I don't think Iran is an evil place or that it's government is the axis of anything at all, other than itself. It's people weren't any different from anyone else I've ever met in my worldly adventures. I see Iran more as a strange, exotic place with even stranger regulations...but still, I'd like the opportunity to know why some things exist as they do. Why women ride in the back of the bus, even while traveling with their husbands, who sit near the front. Why my hair is illegal. Why my voice is illegal. Is my voice such a terrible thing? Is my opinion such a weapon? But most importantly, I'd like to know why I must feel afraid to ask those questions in the first place.

My questions aren't based in anyone's political camp. I'm not aiming to control, or manipulate, or even change anything with my questions. I just want to know 'Why', because I'm curious, like a child. I have similar questions for the leaders of Singapore where it was illegal for me to chew gum in public. Or the leaders of Thailand, where it was illegal for me to speak against the king. I have a multitude of questions for my own nation's leaders, and I'm dead certain those will never be answered; not truthfully anyway.

But, I'm really very proud of my connection to Iran and I was blessed to have been able to go, to have been treated so well and to have experienced one of the most feared nations on the planet from the inside and come out the other end unscathed and all the more educated. Many people openly said that they thought I was crazy to go there; but many people said the same thing to me about India, for different reasons obviously...but I chalked it all up to their own fear of the unknown and went anyway. Iran is an amazing country centered around a beautiful religion - nothing like what we've been conditioned to believe...still, I have a few questions that want to be answered. I'm just afraid to ask.

In lumine Tuo videbimus lumen

That's the motto for Columbia University, one of the most respected Ivy League schools in America, situated in one of the most progressive cities in the nation. It reads "In Thy light shall we see the light". And after the recent bullish political antics of the institution's president, couldn't be more of a joke.

I'm a bit behind the times these days, not paying much attention to the politics of life - with our move back to the States coming up in less than two weeks I'm preoccupied and honestly, I find the neverending soap opera that is the world political stage quite boring (for it's hopelessness) lately. But when I received numerous emails from friends and colleagues in New York about the uproar Ahmadinejad's visit to the East Coast had caused I dug further and found, among others, this LA Times article.

The news out of New York (ie: the American media) is that the Iranian president had the usual inflammatory, oddball things to say - most notably his statement that there are 'no homosexuals in Iran'. (While he personally may not know of any, they certainly exist. But in a country where these things are punishable in the most violent ways who on earth is going to flaunt it?) In any case, maybe I'm picking on the wrong character here, but it wasn't the self-fulfilling prophecy of whatever bizarre things Ahmadinejad had to say that upset me, but rather the equally bizarre behavior of Bollinger, the president of Columbia, who introduced Iran's leader to his student-body audience with a thirty minute speech chock full of blatant insults and sheer rudeness aimed directly at his guest. The introduction consisted of the words: 'astonishingly uneducated', 'belligerent', 'ridiculous' and 'preposterous'...

As the head of a highly respected educational institution Bollinger had a responsibility to choose his words carefully; he spoke for his faculty, he spoke for the students who pay through the nose to patronize his holier-than-thou college, and in some ways, as the host of this charade, he spoke for New York and America in general. So, what did this figurehead do with the very rare and precious opportunity for a civilian to speak directly with one of the most controversial political leaders of our time? How did he approach what could have been a true learning opportunity for not only his students, himself, but his guest and our nation as a whole? He took the stage for the sheer purpose of vomiting his personal opinions all over Ahmadinejad and then abandoned him to the audience's pitchfork questions.

I'm not saying Ahmadinejad should be handled with kid gloves; but a certain amount of respect and kudos should be afforded the man who stepped out of his own comfort zone in order to communicate directly with university students in our country. Ahmadinejad is a professor himself, teaching at Tehran University (where his own students sometimes protest in the streets outside) and as such, it would seem an especially meaningful allowance on his part to take the time to visit with Columbia. Whatever his own political agenda, whatever the state of human rights in his country - he made the effort; and gave us, the citizens, a chance to speak with him firsthand instead of hearing him through the thick filter of bureaucrats and media translations we're usually fed from. And what on earth did we learn about Iran or it's leader from this very public verbal stoning? As far as I can see, absolutely nothing; and all because Bollinger took it upon himself to devolve the summit into a personal sounding board. What did we learn about ourselves? Plenty, I hope...but I'm not holding my breath.

Ahmadinejad said a number of strange things after Bollinger handed him over to the crowd. But one thing he said that makes perfect sense, and we'd do well to learn from was, "In Iran, when we invite a guest, we show them respect."

After the event was over Bollinger touted himself as a 'speak[er] of truth to power', lauded our nation's freedoms of opinion and speech, and those freedoms truly are things to be celebrated - but his arrogant waste of an opportunity for real discourse is an absolute shame and makes a mockery of our nation and it's 'freedoms', ultimately further proving what the rest of the world already says about America behind it's back, that we are a nation of loud-mouthed bullies. That's the truth everyone else is speaking in nearly every country on the planet today, in light of this event.

If Bollinger had upheld the high standards of his Ivy League school, if he had taken the motto "In lumine Tuo videbimus lumen" to heart it quite possibly could have been the single most enlightening and future-forward movement to take place between Iran and America in the last thirty years. But no, instead, Columbia's face-man threw that very possibility straight into the trash. Not exactly what I would call 'seeing the light'.

Pray for us sinners

The phone rang last night. It was Iran calling. Hamid's parents have returned home from Mecca and relayed a story so sweetly profound and full of love I couldn't help but adore them all the more.

As it turns out, there was a whole lot more than praying going on in the Middle East's holiest city this past week. Hdmis's mother bought a little set of baby boy clothes and then went early in the morning to the Kabbah to bless the tiny outfit with a gentle rub against the ancient stones.

I find myself overwhelmed by this gesture of devotion for a child who has yet to amount to even a single divided cell.

Amazing.

After my own heart

I received an email via thesuperheavy a few months ago from an American woman living in Iran with her Persian husband. An artist, she was looking for my recommendation of a seamstress in Tehran to help her with a textiles project she's working on. Considering the disaster that was my wedding dress our conversations quickly turned to other things: namely what it's like to live in the Middle East; how interesting, charming, and downright suffocating the closeness of family in Iran can be for a Westerner more accustomed to and trained for autonomy to the hilt; what it means to have to don a uniform each and every time one wants to leave the house; how ironic it is that, as women, we must obey the law dictating what we wear but that as Iranian citizens we are allowed to not only vote but run for parliament. We talked about art and philosophy, travel and family.

Through the course of conversation I learned that like me, she has a hard time with the scarf-business but otherwise loves Iran; that, like me, she is seven years older than her darling; and that, like me, she is an insatiable travel addict.

I casually invited her to meet me for lunch here in Kathmandu, offered the couple a room in our house, and assured them that the tourist visa process for Iranians in Nepal was a piece of cake.

I've invited quite a few people to come stay with us here in Nepal, friends, family - and although many started out excitedly researching the possibility of a holiday in the Himalayas not one was able to rationalize the lengthy journey and close to $3,000 plane ticket. But this woman whom I'd never met packed herself and her husband up and flew all the way to Nepal from Iran (a solid 24 hours journey each way) for a ten day visit.

We met at Mike's Breakfast, a local joint run by an American midwesterner and a new favorite, and while sipping Bloody Mary's over lunch she gifted me an exceptionally beautiful piece of her original art - in Persian script, it is a talisman on paper, embodying the energy of movement and travel, the joy and love of new experience. I made her sign it at the table and while she was doing so I was struck by just how small this world is, and how precious the adventurous spirit.

Truly, after my own heart.

Haji Baby and the ungrateful wretch

Hamid's parents are in Kathmandu fom Iran this past week and next, which is great - I adore them both.
Hamid's dad, while of a seriously genius mental caliber, is hilarious and makes me laugh with his innate and charming ability to channel his inner child at will. He drfits in and out of silliness most naturally, in a way few grown men are apt to do; calling to his wife Hajieh in sing-song "Haji Baby!!!" as she moves about our kitchen preparing wonderful Persian dishes on our ridiculous two burner gas stove. How she manages to create these culinary masterpieces with such limited equipment is beyond me, but she seems to have imported herself all this way for the sole purpose of feeding Hamid and I three square meals a day.
Hamid's mom kisses me hello every morning and calls me 'Tessam' (my Tess) and 'baby'. She is generous to a fault asking me "You want?" every time my gaze lingers on anything for more than a second. She runs a close tie with my own mother as the most selfless person ever to exist in all of human history.

While they've been here they've spoiled us both rotten with lavish meals, gifts, and one entire suitcase full of the delectable dried fruit and nut assortments and sweets so common to Iranian tea time.

They've even indulged my latest habit of buying baby and children's clothes; supplying me with two darling tiny pairs of shoes I just couldn't take my eyes off in the store the other day. (Before we left India I bought entire closets full of lovely little traditional girl and boy wearables made of sari silk - Nepal's adorable hippie-patchwork style has also caught my eye and I've doubled my as-yet nonexistent children's wardrobes with locally handcrafted skirts, pants, hats and tops.)

Hamid's parents are quite simply the most dreamy set of in-laws one could ever hope for. They're supportive and kind and sweet and funny and completely pleased with me in every respect. This makes my life a hundred times easier than it might be considering the vast difference in culture and attitude that draws an unavoidable, invisible line between us. I'm Muslim now, but only so much...and I'm Iranian on one set of papers but still oh-so-American in every respect.

We're a real motley crew, mowing through rows and rows of shops in Nepal's old royal city of Patan; buying up Tibetan singing bowls and Nepali arts and crafts; Hamid's father dressed smartly in a suit, his mother in her scarf and manteau and me in my comparatively half-naked attire of sundresses or tank tops. Hamid's parents, while madly in love, have been socially conditioned not to display affection in public, while Hamid and I fall all over ourselves to get closer to eachother no matter where we are. Hamid and I are outright in our ideas, questioning, and opinions - appearing hyper and even wild next to his mom and dad who speak quietly and calmly, weighing their words before uttering a single one. But the happy reality is none of us cares much how the others choose to dress or act or speak or think. We're each in it for the simple experience of being together, practicing the art of being a family - philosophies and social skills aside.

But...and here comes the guilt-ridden, I'm-a-wretch portion of this post: it's so, so, so hard for me to have people in my house - messing up my nicely placed whatnots and mucking up my kitchen which is always sparkling clean because it never gets used and I know...I know how ridiculous it is to be rolling my eyes when Hamid's mom leaves the bottle of cooking oil out on the counter instead of keeping it neatly hidden in the cabinet the way I like it. After all, she's the one cooking 24 hours a day, who am I to complain; treated as an honored and pampered guest in my own home. But six days of sharing space with people who've been around twice as long as I have and by default take precedence in the hierarchy is simply exhausting for the control freak in me.

I'm a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad daughter-in-law but it drives me crazy when I come downstairs and see that all of my plants have been moved outside into the garden (after I worked so hard lugging the darn things in in the first place) or find laundry hanging on the main floor balcony where everyone and their cousin can see it instead of on one of the third floor balconies where it doesn't mar the beauty of the view of the house from the street.

These things I get stuck on are meaningless. Pointless and shallow - and I'm perfectly aware of how very ungrateful it would appear if I let on at all; so I say nothing and smile until the urge to put everything back 'where it belongs' passes. Instead of freaking out when the giant package of toilet paper ends up on display somewhere in the house or my carefully chosen kitchen towels turn up sopping wet and goopy I remind myself that these are the people who have willingly, lovingly given me everything they have to give and then some, including their first born child.

You are so not funny

As if there was any question...but now it's doubly clear who I'm not voting for.
From CNN, a brief report on and video of McCain making up his own little ditty about the possibility of bombing Iran.
Anyone who finds it appropriate to joke about killing people, an entire nation - Iran or otherwise, is a bad choice for leadership in my book. I generally think of death and destruction as a 'bad thing'. But hey, that's just me.

Just put up a map and throw a dart...

Well, I'm doing my very best to pretend that it doesn't freak me out at all that we're leaving India permanently in less than two months and we still don't really know where we're going...but I do believe in the power of imagination, and I've successfully 'faked' my way through many difficult life transitions and am comforted by the fact that eventually whatever it was I simply believed I was experiencing settled itself in nicely as reality.
There are plenty of people who will say that that just doesn't make sense. That a person can't just fake their way through the bad parts until the bad parts are as convinced as you that they just don't exist - but let me tell you I can, I do, and I will.

We may or may not be going to Iran after all, and for reasons better left undisclosed at this point so it's not really worth getting into at all except to say that it essentially leaves us drifting along in the global scheme of things with no real direction. Until recently, it was to be the next stop after Nepal, and a nice locae in relation to our needing to be in Turkey at some point (the when of which I still have no idea as we wait to hear from someone at the U.S. Embassy in Ankara) but for now at least, it's looking less like an option. A shame really; I'd quite gotten myself geared up for it by ordering loads of capri pants and wedges from the States in anticipation of making due with the dress code. I even decided to sample a pair of ballet flats...something I'd not ordinarily be caught dead in but is so insanely popular in Tehran I decided to at least attempt them. Fortunately, Coach makes a lovely version called 'Joy'.

In any case, I'll cart my stuff along to wherever...and Nepal is looking likely at this point as they allow foreigners five months (150 days in any visa year) in the country without any major hassle, and of course Miss Jess is there now; complete with hotel=bathtub and connections through her darling to help us find a house, set up WiFi and all the other things one needs to stay in business in the virtual world.

And then, there's Turkey - a certainty at some point, and allowing foreigners a three month visa at the port of entry. I'm not sure of the possibility of a visa extension there, but assuming they are reasonable I'd say we can eke out at least another thirty days beyond that. So, we're covered for approximately nine months past the end of May (and both countries will allow us to bring Mooshy in with proper papers...yet another piece of the puzzle).

If we've not been awarded Hamid's visa to the States at that point we'll be looking at another round of applications from scratch as his original forms, doctor's reports, and affidavits are only valid for 365 days after they are initially submitted.

We watch the news, understanding something of how the U.S. is working with Iranian visas these days: not issuing them in time for the President of Iran to arrive for a meeting at the U.N. I mean, if they can't get it together to issue him a visa in time for a meeting of international world leaders we're concerned that we're now facing the gloomier side of our expectations as surely we are much farther down on their list of what and who is important.

I'm now scrutinizing the paperwork that was sent to me when we were first asked to come to the Consulate here in Chennai, India as well as the way the case was handled once we arrived for the interview and realizing that we kind of got played.
First they made a big deal about my income, but according to their little chart I make three times what is required for a family of two to return to the States with the better half on an entry visa. My 12 months worth of freshly printed PDF bank statements were of no importance though.
Then they suggested that I no longer have ties to the United States, having been in India so long - but when I offered a letter signed by both of my parents essentially imploring the Consul to issue the visa so we could come home already the girl looked at me from behind her wire rim glasses and mustache and said "Yeah, I have a mom too..." as if I had some elaborate plan to convince her that my parents love me and know exactly where I am when, as far as she was concerned, I don't have and never did have any parents at all.
Only after I returned three hours later, frustrated and confused, did they announce that we would have to go to one of five other countries to complete the application.
In response to my flustered demeanor the Consul asked me if I'd like him to 'expatriate me, right here, right now' - as if that was the solution to all my troubles. Yes, they are sensitive folks those government employees.

Sad...really...I was initially so impressed with everyone else we'd met with and talked to throughout the process.

Anyway, since my own country is in no big hurry to make it easy for me to come home with my husband (anything else is out of the question, so don't even suggest it) I'm scanning Embassy and Immigration websites for as many countries as I can dream up, calculating where we can get the most tourist visa leeway and how many days we can stay, etc. etc.

Kind of fun, really...having nowhere to go and so many amazing options in the meantime.

Dreaming of Tehran

Listening to Ahmadinejad from Tehran's Freedom Square (a beautiful structure we spent a few late evenings enjoying from the park below during our last trip to Iran) via CNN this afternoon, I cannot help but reiterate my previous opinion that Iran should be entitiled to develop nuclear power for it's nation without threats or interference from the first world, if for no other reason than to avoid the obviously hypocritical stance of the U.S. - a nation with the largest stockpile of nuclear weapons on the planet - and nuclear power and weapons are far flung, although the administration would have us believing otherwise; that they may as well be the same thing.
I've always enjoyed listening to Ahmadinejad speak - arriving at a more realistic understanding of his message when translated by my husband who has no reason to skew the President's words toward the maniacal verbal wanderings the Bush agenda would have the American public believe are being spoken. His philosophy, while consistently Islamic in foundation and tone, is very easily generalized to encompass all peoples and faiths (the country is populated by all manner of religions, including Christians, Jews, and the Mulsim interfaith). He has nothing to prove, and will not be cowed - good for him, I say.
In any case, nothing Ahmadinejad has said today sounds particularly hard-line or tyrannical...but it's up to the American media to translate and interpret the words of the Iranian President with honesty.
It will be interesting to see how the speech is handled and presented in the West via the various media outlets; one can only hope...
They are already speculating that his lack of message 'means something more.' As if anything and everything was fraught with hidden agenda. They are desperate to find something with which to pick him and his words apart.

At the same time, with this renewed focus on Iran at the anniversary of their revolution, the media reminds me through the lens how beautiful the country is and how warm the people are and I am so excited to be able to look forward just three and a half months to when we will once again wake up each morning in our spacious Tehran apartment, spending our days beneath Tochal - the snowy mountain that looms literally in our backyard, and enjoy our Persian family.

Kinda cool

A quick trip to Hyderabad on Monday, two flights in one day = happy exhaustion and a brand new Persian passport.
SO weird to see myself all scarfed-out in the photo page, next to stamps from the very gracious Iranian consul and that lovely Persian script I can only hope to be able to actually read one day. They've done some kind of fabulous photoshop on the image - making my eyes appear very, very blue and my lips and cheeks a natural soft pink that I really don't remember as having graced my visage the day the photo was taken. I'm flattered and wonder why we don't do the same in the U.S. for driver's licenses and the like.

I am now, for all intents and purposes, both American and Iranian. No small thing considering the increasingly tense political relationship between the two nations.

The passport, a lovely deep reddish brown color opens and reads right to left, as all Persian books do, and has it's pinkish pages graced by a very faint watermark of the face of Imam Khomeini inside an ornate star pattern - like the middle of a delicately designed Persian carpet. It's quite pretty, actually - and evokes the same feelings of potential adventure and excitement my own United States passport did when I first received it, brand new and a bit stiff.

Now, we've just to figure out exactly how I'm meant to travel around with the two passports - naturally the majority of my travel stamps will go into the American passport, which had become so full it was annotated with an extra 25 or so pages while we were at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi last year. But the question of with which passport do I stamp in and out of various countries before and after a visit to Iran remains. I know there are loads of people with dual citizenship (and a relative collection of passports) happily cruising around from country to country without issue - I've just got to figure out the protocol.

The passport, which expires after the normal five year period extended to any Iranian passport, allows my unfettered travel to and from Iran - no more visas to apply for or extend. No concern for the American-ness of me getting in the way of enjoying the other half of our family at will. This is a freedom for which I am eternally grateful.

It will be interesting to see if my own country is as forthcoming with a passport for my darling Iranian husband.
We can only hope for the best.

It was either PMS or the truth

The truth is I was a bit upset when I wrote the last post - there was an article in the local paper about how India's social values must incorporate more creative arts in order to flourish and with everything else that's been going on around here lately it just sent me over the edge. Yes, creative arts are crucial to a blossoming society and it's people - but so are the basics like clean water, social health, and a good education - things sorely and so obviously lacking in this nation. These days, India just makes me sad, and being sad makes me tired. And so I'm sad and I'm tired and really just ready to get out of here.

Fortunately, we've just received the very last of the papers we need to make ourselves presentable to the U.S. Consulate - very exciting developments indeed.
We expect to know if they will make the rest of the process very, very easy or very, very hard for us sometime in the next two months. In all honesty, I'm thinking they're likely to be quite nice and helpful - if they opt not to be my own fate as a girl very much in love with her husband and not seeing separation as an option would lie somewhere in the vicinity of Iran proper - and I'm banking on the guess that at this particular juncture they'd like to keep their own a little closer to home than that.

In the meantime, I'm getting packed for next weekend when I've to go on my twice-yearly excursion to Sri Lanka for a bubble bath and some good duty-free shopping. Just 24 hours on the quiet island will make a world of difference in my perspective. And when I return we'll start counting down the days until we can pack up for good...

Rock the vote - global

Another souvenir received: my Persian identity card complete with black scarfed head shot and my birthdate listed in the year 1352 by the Iranian calendar.
Intimidating in it's official Islamic Republic red government jacket and stamp - and yet liberating, giving me the right to vote, to get a driver's license, to own property, to start a business, and even run for Parliament in Iran (if I was so inclined and could master the art of diplomacy in Farsi).

The identity card provides my citizen number, a list of my family members (currently limited to Hamid with space for more babies than I can imagine producing in a single lifetime), and a card to record any issues I vote on.

Now I am American and Persian. No small feat considering the current state of affairs.

While we were visiting the Iranian Consulate we submitted the papers necessary to acquire my Persian passport. If that is issued, then and only then will I be allowed to enter the country again.
There are no more visas for American tourists, at least not right now, which is too bad really - I hear Iran is gorgeous this time of year.

Don't hate the player, hate the game

With Annan practically begging for those in charge to begin acting in a way that embodies peace Ahmadinejad quite rudely